SaaS redesign: five models, not five names

We don’t rank companies, we compare ways of working. Five models, the same six criteria for everyone, ours included, with what it can’t do. It’s up to you to say which one fits your product and your cash position.

The six criteria

• Specialization: Does this model redo products every day, or once in a while?

• Fixed price or time and materials: A price written down in advance, or a meter that keeps running as long as it lasts?

• Team size: How many people, and what happens the day one of them leaves?

• Entry price: What you need to put on the table to get started, excluding subscriptions and hosting.

• Code ownership: Who owns the code, the access and the data, and from when?

• Maintenance: Who answers, how fast and at what price, six months after delivery?

What each one does, and doesn’t do

The large agency

Several dozen people, established teams, and a project manager between you and the people who write the code.

• Specialization: Generalist: product, brand, advertising

• Fixed price or time and materials: Time and materials, after 2 to 4 weeks of scoping

• Team size: Established teams, internal replacement

• Entry price: Range not collected by us

• Code ownership: Depends on the contract

• Maintenance: Separate contract, negotiated after delivery

When it’s the right choice

• Several workstreams to run in parallel, across several disciplines.

• An organization that already has someone in-house to hold the technical direction.

• A need to cover brand, advertising and product in one place.

What this model doesn’t do

• Scoping is billed before you’ve seen a single screen.

• You talk to a project manager, not to the people who write the code.

Check before you sign

• The quote doesn’t name the people who will code.

• The price is time and materials, with no written cap.

• Code ownership lives in an email, not in the contract.

The product studio

About ten people, a single craft: designing and building digital products, often from a blank page.

• Specialization: Product: design and development

• Fixed price or time and materials: Fixed price per project or per cycle

• Team size: 5 to 20 people, several disciplines

• Entry price: Range not collected by us

• Code ownership: Depends on the contract

• Maintenance: Monthly plan offered at delivery

When it’s the right choice

• A product to design from scratch, with a significant design component.

• A simultaneous need for design, development and mobile.

• A strong brand to translate on screen.

What this model doesn’t do

• Taking over someone else’s code isn’t always their ground.

• Your schedule depends on the other projects running on their side.

Check before you sign

• No takeover of existing code in the references shown.

• The quote starts from a blank page when your product already runs.

• The migration of your data isn’t priced anywhere.

The freelancer

One person, a short contract, a start within a few days. This is the model that built most of the V1s we’re asked to take over.

• Specialization: The person’s own, to check case by case

• Fixed price or time and materials: By the day, or a short fixed-price job

• Team size: One person

• Entry price: Depends on the profile

• Code ownership: To be written into the contract, with the access

• Maintenance: Depends on their availability

When it’s the right choice

• A defined, written, short job.

• Extra hands on a team that already exists.

• Moving a product forward while a hire is in progress.

What this model doesn’t do

• Everything rests on one person: vacation, illness, a more interesting assignment elsewhere.

• Nobody reviews the code that gets written.

Check before you sign

• The code lives on their account, not yours.

• No documentation is planned in the quote.

• One person holds the access to hosting and payments.

The no-code agency

Apps assembled in a tool (Bubble, FlutterFlow, Softr) without writing code, and live within a few weeks.

• Specialization: The tool: Bubble, FlutterFlow, Softr

• Fixed price or time and materials: Short fixed price, by the week or by the module

• Team size: 1 to 5 people

• Entry price: Range not collected by us

• Code ownership: No source code to take away

• Maintenance: The tool subscription, plus new features

When it’s the right choice

• Validating an idea before investing in development.

• An internal tool, a back office, a complicated form.

• A product whose rules and volume stay simple.

What this model doesn’t do

• The ceiling arrives with business rules and the number of users.

• The subscription bill rises with usage, not with revenue.

Check before you sign

• Your payments and customer accounts exist only in the tool.

• Nobody has priced what it would cost to get out.

• The data access rules have never been checked.

The senior product team (us)

A senior team founded by an engineer, which takes over and redesigns SaaS products and apps. The people who talk to you are the people who code.

• Specialization: SaaS takeover and redesign. Nothing else

• Fixed price or time and materials: Fixed price, three milestones: 30 / 40 / 30

• Team size: A senior founder, surrounded by trusted specialists

• Entry price: Online estimate, fixed price in the quote

• Code ownership: On your GitHub repository from day one

• Maintenance: 3 to 20 days a month, as a flat plan

When it’s the right choice

• A V1 that still holds up but is slowing growth.

• An app to take over without its original developer.

• A founder without a CTO who wants a contact who codes.

Our limits, said out loud

• A small senior team. Not ten, not thirty.

• No showcase sites, no e-commerce, no games: we recommend someone good and stay on our own craft.

• We don’t recruit your in-house team.

• The audit is billed separately: it isn’t deducted from the redesign price.

When it isn’t us

• You need five developers in parallel next month: that isn’t us.

• Your project is an online store: that isn’t us.

• You want a firm quote before the audit: we can’t do that honestly.

How to combine them

• The audit with one, the redesign with another: Nothing forces you to entrust both to the same provider. Our audit report is written to be applied by someone other than us, including the developer you already have.

• The prototype in the tool, the product in code: A no-code tool or an AI generator is for proving that an idea interests someone. The move to code is prepared before the first paying customers arrive, not after.

• The foundations on one side, the new features on the other: Once the foundations are laid and documented, a freelancer can handle the day-to-day changes. That’s even the goal: the code must be something someone other than its author can take over.

• The brand apart from the product: The public website, the advertising and the identity don’t call for the same team as your app. We don’t build showcase sites, and that’s just fine.

Where the numbers come from

• Our simulator gives a range after a few questions; the fixed price is written in the quote.

• We don’t publish any price range we haven’t collected ourselves: it would be more convenient, and dishonest.

• No company is named in this comparison. This isn’t a legal precaution: a brand name says nothing about what happens once the quote is signed, a way of working does.